The present invention relates to a refrigerant compressor, and more particularly, to a wobble plate type piston compressor for an air conditioning system in which the compressor includes a mechanism for adjusting the capacity of the compressor.
Generally, in air conditioning apparatus, thermal control is accomplished by intermittent operation of the compressor in response to a signal from a thermostat located in the room being cooled. Once the temperature in the room has been lowered to a desired temperature, the refrigerant capacity of the air conditioning system generally need not be very large in order to handle supplemental cooling because of further temperature changes in the room or for keeping the room at the desired temperature. Accordingly, after the room has cooled down to the desired temperature, the most common technique for controlling the output of the compressor is by intermittent operation of the compressor. However, this intermittent operation of the compressor results in the intermittent application of a relatively large load to the driving mechanism of the compressor in order to drive the compressor.
In automobile air conditioning compressors, the compressor is driven by the engine of the automobile through an electromagnetic clutch. These automobile air conditioning compressors face the same intermittent load problems described above once the passenger compartment reaches a desired temperature. Control of the compressor normally is accomplished by intermittent operation of the compressor through the electromagnetic clutch which couples the automobile engine to the compressor. Thus, the relatively large load which is required to drive the compressor is intermittently applied to the automobile engine.
Furthermore, since the compressor of an automobile air conditioner is driven by the engine of the automobile, the rotation frequency of the drive mechanism changes from moment to moment, which causes the refrigerant capacity to change in proportion to the rotation frequency of the engine. Since the capacity of the evaorator and condenser of the air conditioner does not change, when the compressor is driven at high rotation, the compressor performs useless work. To avoid performing useless work, prior art automobile air conditioning compressors often are controlled by intermittent operation of the magnetic clutch. Again, this results in a large load being intermittently applied to the automobile engine.